Who lives in Cairns?

Cairns is a welcoming, multicultural city

More than 22 per cent of the Cairns population was born overseas, and 10 per cent of people in Cairns identify as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander.

Cairns people who were not born in Australia are most likely to have come to Cairns from:

• United Kingdom, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, India, Japan and Germany

You can find out more about Cairns' First Peoples or Connecting with Multicultural Communities on Cairns Regional Council's website.

Cairns has a young population

We are a young city with a median age of 39. Young couples with children making up a quarter of our population.

• Cairns, compared to Australia at the last census, shows that there was a higher proportion of people in the younger age groups (0 to 17 years) and a lower proportion of people in the older age groups (60+ years)
• Overall, 22.1% of the population was aged between 0 and 17, and 25.6% were aged 60 years and over, compared with 21.7% and 23% respectively for Australia
• Our largest growing population sectors in recent years include young workers, older workers and 'empty nesters'.

Cairns people are well-educated

We are well educated with 52.6% of residents over 15 years of age qualified to certificate level or above:

• 19.1% qualified to Bachelor or Higher degree
• 9.8% qualified to Advance Diploma or Diploma
• 23.7% qualified to Vocational level